Terror and Pity

Kirill Ospovat received his PhD from the Russian State University for the Humanities (RGGU, Moscow) in 2005. He has held various postdoctoral appointments in Russia, Germany, the UK, and the US, most recently in the ERC-funded research group “Early modern drama and the cultural net” at the Freie Universität Berlin.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroductionPART IPOLITICAL THEATER AND THE ORIGINS OF RUSSIAN TRAGIC DRAMATheater at CourtSumarokov and the réformation du theaterPolitical Theater and the Poetics of Autocracy“Scenarios of Power”: The Politics of Tragic PlotsDramatic Experience: Tragedy and the Emotional Economy of the Court PART IIKHOREV, OR THE TRAGEDY OF ORIGINPoetry, History, AllegoryKhorev and the Scenario of MarriagePastoral Politics and TragedyThe Tragedy of Suspicion PART IIIPOETIC JUSTICE: COUP D’ÉTAT, POLITICAL THEOLOGY, AND THE POLITICS OF SPECTACLE IN THE RUSSIAN HAMLETTragedy and Political TheologyThe Drama of Coup d’état Anatomy of Melancholy, or Gamlet the HeroInvestigations of MaliceThe Catharsis of Pardon EPILOGUETHE THEATER OF WAR AND PEACE: THE “MIRACLE OF THE HOUSE OF BRANDENBURG” AND THE POETICS OF EUROPEAN ABSOLUTISMTragedy and Political Theology on the BattlefieldFrederick, or the Performance of DefeatPeter, or the Tragedy of TriumphConclusion: Tragedy, History, and Theory Bibliography

“...this bowdlerized regularization of Shakespeare’s beloved play...elicits considerable scholarly interest. Ospovat’s reading of Gamlet through Machiavelli, Benjamin, and Schmitt transforms it into an astonishingly relevant depiction of the rise of charismatic tyranny during moments of political crisis (states of exception), perceived or real.”